Government should act fast to arrest continuous sharp decline in Exports: Ralhan
Author(s): City Air NewsLudhiana, June 16, 2015: Reacting to the sharp decline on the trade data for May 2015, Mr S C Ralhan, President, Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) said that the continuous negative double growth in...
cityairnews
Jun 16, 2015 12:30
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Ludhiana, June 16, 2015: Reacting to the sharp decline on the trade data for May 2015, Mr S C Ralhan, President, Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) said that the continuous negative double growth in exports since December 2014, is matter of serious and grave concern as the decline has further exasperated to over the 20% in May 2015. This, if allowed to continue will severely impact the Indian economy. FIEO has been continuously raising this serious concern with the government, said Mr Ralhan. However with such kind of steep decline, FIEO expects that the government should take a serious note and act fast to arrest the decline.
FIEO Chief stated that the prime reason continues to be low prices of crude, metal and commodity. Petroleum exports further declined sharply by 59.10% which itself is responsible for an overall decline of about 12%, as the sector used to contribute to 20% of country’s exports. Mr Ralhan said that decline in exports of Engineering Goods, Gems & Jewellery, Organic & Inorganic chemicals, Drugs & Pharmaceuticals, Leather & Leather Products, Electronic Goods and Plastics & Linoleum are of equal concern as these sectors have also either shown further decline or have further moved into negative territory. President FIEO said that emerging economies particularly of Asia are also contracting due to slowing down of China. Mr Ralhan said that Indian exporters are also losing out their competitiveness due to high logistics cost and ground level transaction costs.
Adding to the woes, the services sector have also shown a decline in both exports and imports by around 5% and 20% in April, 2015 respectively as compared to the same period previous fiscal.
Mr Ralhan said that the Interest Subvention Scheme may be re-introduced immediately and liquidity crunch of the exporters in the form of refunds may be addressed with timely release of the exports benefits. Also need of the hour is the immediate Introduction of Export Development Fund for aggressive marketing.
Date:
Tuesday, June 16, 2015
